More than 70 people have already registered to attend a special rock fishing safety workshop in Batemans Bay this weekend.
The event, at the local surf club in Malua Bay on Saturday morning from 9, organised following six deaths along our coastline from the activity over the past twelve months…the most recent at North Durras earlier this month.
Surf Life Saving NSW Community Education Manager Annika Ferrari said we recognise from the statistics that it is now, unfortunately, the second leading cause of coastal drownings in New South Wales so it’s very important for us, that as part of our education team, we are specifically targeting those who are at risk of drowning.
“There was a very unfortunate incident that happened at North Durras recently last weekend. We’re hoping to come out to the community and and build that educational awareness,” Ms Ferrari said.
“We’re very lucky to have a coastal research team at Surf Life Saving, that actually work hand in hand with all the data from all the incidents across the state so when we choose our workshop locations, that is purely based off both incident location but also resident locations,” she said.
“We do know that since 2004 we’ve had a total of 32 rock fishing drownings for South Coast and Far South Coast between Shellharbour and Bega Valley Shires.
“We know that six of those have occurred in the past 12 months, which is why we are specifically targeting this area.”
The free workshop on Saturday is open to everyone.
“It’s for everyone, whether you’re beginner rock fishers, so you either haven’t rockfished before or you’ve done it maybe once or twice, all the way through immediate and to actually advance rock fishers as well because,” Ms Ferrari said.
“Just because you’ve been doing it a long time doesn’t always necessarily mean you’ve got everything under your belt, around the exact precautions you can take in order to best prepare yourself,” she said.
“We’ve tried and tested lots of different mechanisms and we found that the workshop runs really, really well when we bring in some really key stakeholders. So Surf Life Saving NSW put on the workshop and we build a space where everyone can sort of come and connect and we’ve invite along Maritime NSW and they do a really awesome focus within our life jackets piece. We’ve just partnered and brought the Bureau of Meteorology on board. They do a specific piece around coastal conditions and understanding emergency apps and understanding the swell and how to read the swell and being best repaired in that space. We also have some experienced rock fishermen.”
Ms Ferrari added attendees to the workshop will be given a free life jacket and shown how to properly fit it.
“Unfortunately not wearing a lifejacket is absolutely the main factor that we are finding that our data is showing that absolutely people who are unfortunately losing their life aren’t wearing a life jacket or it hasn’t been fitted correctly,” she said.
“So a really big part of our workshops and our education is one we hand out upwards of 1500 life jackets throughout this project, which are free to the community, but we also spend a really, really long time in how to fit it correctly in doing tests to show people that even when you think it may be fitted correctly.
“There’s all these checks you can do that essentially ensure that it is fitted correctly and it doesn’t either raise above your mouth and obstruct your breathing or it doesn’t slip off completely when you’re essentially submerged in water.
“We are absolutely inviting everyone to continue to sign up and they can do so all the way until Saturday.”
